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Can it! Preserving summer's bounty
REVIEWS BY SYBIL PRATT
By Karen Ward Wiley, $16.99 264 pages, ISBN 0764524712
By Marion Brown University of North Carolina Press, $18.95 340 pages, ISBN 0807854182
Celebrating the seasons
By Maria Helm Sinskey HarperCollins, $32.50 416 pages, ISBN 0060013966
A chicken in every pot
Why did the time-crazed cook cross the road? To get a rotisserie chicken. Ah! One of life's lingering riddles has finally been solved.
By Carla Fitzgerald Williams Hyperion, $14.95 336 pages, ISBN 0786888040
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The end of summer is, for many, the beginning of the big-time canning season. If you're a canning wannabe or have found yourself
in a preserving pickle, all the info you need is
in Canning & Preserving for Dummies by Karen Ward. I'm not exaggerating—the
Dummies approach can turn you into a canning smartie even if you've never opened a Mason jar. You get the basics first:
step-by-step instructions, with an emphasis on safety, for each technique (water bath canning, pressure canning, freezing and drying).
You'll learn how to get your gear in gear and put your fears to rest. Unmistakable Dummies icons point out tips and shortcuts,
information truly worth repeating, potential problems and the interesting technical stuff, and you'll find a whole section of
troubleshooting tips, should trouble bubble up. Oh yeah, there are recipes too—and good ones—for fresh-picked fruit,
sweet spreads, condiments, pickles, sauces, salsas, syrups, soups and stocks.
My father was a confident, canny canner, and I still use his berry-stained, dog-eared copy of Marion Brown's Pickles and Preserves.
How lucky we are that this canning classic has been reissued
by the University of North Carolina Press with a new foreword by Damon Lee Fowler that
explains both historical preserving methods and the updated methods recommended today. First published in 1955, Pickles and
Preserves itself preserves a piece of our culinary heritage—408 recipes for everything from Artichoke Pickle to Pickled
Blueberries, Georgia Chow-Chow to Rhubarb Chutney, Dill String Beans to Spiced Apple Jelly and an array of catsups made from
cucumbers, cranberries, mushrooms and grapes. An old treasure for a new generation of cooks.
Support your 
Being creative with what's fresh and available is the pleasing principle behind the 40 fabulous menus—10 for each
season—included in Maria Helm Sinskey's new cookbook, The Vineyard Kitchen.
Sinskey, an award-winning California chef, cooking teacher and culinary director of the Robert Sinskey Vineyards in Napa Valley, makes
sure that the recipes—145 in all—respect and reflect the merits of the seasons. Right now, golden sweet corn could
highlight a savory September supper that starts with rosemary-scented corn soup served with warm buttermilk biscuits, and
late-season purple plums can star in an elegant Roasted Italian Prune Galette made with cream cheese tart dough. Soon,
rustic root vegetables will be front and center, cooked with comforting Red-Wine Braised Short Ribs, or Braised Lamb Shanks,
then it will be spring again and time for Baby Leeks Vinaigrette and Asparagus and Lemon Risotto. For me, the real fun and
fascination of menu cookbooks is to see how the pros construct a meal, how they mix tastes and textures. Sinskey often starts
with salad or a tempting vegetable-based tart; her main courses rarely need a side other than good crusty bread; and the
desserts, from a dreamy Fallen Chocolate Soufflé Cake to golden Brandied Pears, offer sweet, balanced endings. You can
vary these three-course meals depending on your appetite and what's available at your local market. Wine suggestions, as
you might well expect, are offered with each marvelous menu.
Produce markets may be overflowing with summer's last bountiful gasp but, for most of us, it's back to school, back to work and back
to getting dinner on the table fast. Next time you want to chicken out of cooking a main course from scratch, you can do it
stylishly with the ready recipes Carla Fitzgerald Williams offers in
Rotisserie Chickens to the Rescue! How to Use the Already-Roasted Chickens You Purchase at the Market to Make More Than 125 Simple and Delicious Meals.
Now, there's a subtitle that says it all. But if you want to know a little more, here goes: all the ingredients Ms. Williams calls
for are easily available, no special equipment is needed, there are tips about leftovers, company dinners, do-ahead dishes, cutting
out fat and more.